on being so angry I'm speechless

A guy in a Lexus in front of us threw a McDonald's cup out his window as he drove up my street. When we pulled up next to him, Nick said, "Stop throwing trash in my neighborhood."

Tell me why this man said, "Fuck this neighborhood."

"What?" I asked. 

"Fuck this neighborhood," he repeated. 

"Well, we don't feel that way," I responded.

"Well I do." He paused. "Thanks for telling me how you feel, though."

Nick and I just sat there in angry silence. As the light turned green and we pulled off, the man shouted something unintelligible at us. So brave of him.

I've never been so angry. Or so speechless.

a better son/daughter

This song does a really good job of outlining how I've been feeling lately. I'm working on it. Be back soon.

on being dynamic

Me: You're a weirdo. 

Nick: Me? Why?

Me: You just went from "Wagon Wheel" to Ghostface Killah.

Nick: I'm not weird. I'm dynamic.

some things that have happened lately

I said goodbye to this guy, who'll be out of town for the next year.

I got my hair braided, and now look remarkably like Melissa Harris-Perry.

I invited the rest of my fantasy league over to watch the Packers stomp the Redskins.

My kid sister obviously cheered with me. 

Although some of my friends didn't take the loss too hard.

And I went to the Maryland State Wine Festival with a bunch of my sorority sisters.

There's never been enough of us all together at once to take a black Phi Alph photo - so exciting!

The Fall 2003 pledge class Guthrie and I oversaw.

So good things are happening. Very good things. Just not my dissertation.

naming a fantasy league is hard

I decided that this year, I want to run my own fantasy football league. This is partially because I didn't have another one to join, and partially because I think playing with all my friends will be WAY more fun than playing with a bunch of someone else's. And before I can even encounter any problems as the commissioner, I'm faced with the most epic challenge of all: naming the damn thing.

Here are the current contenders:
DMVPs
Not Great Bob
Password Is Taco
Lazy Sundays
Team Zissou

I'm thinking that my team name will probably be Mr. Rodger's Neighborhood, or maybe I'll go with last year's epically rude Yankee Doodle Handy.*

Anyway, help me come up with a league name, so I can invite people already. I'm spending way too much time on this part. I've got a team to put together!


*Dear strangers reading this blog, in my personal life, an unusually large proportion of the words that come out of my mouth are filthy. I'm like Joe Biden with better boobs. And so, for both that image of vice-presidential man-boobs and my keeping it clean here, you're welcome.

what I've been up to

I'm posting more photos than usual lately, mostly because they do a better job than I could at describing what I've been doing. This post is no different.

I finished my summer policy internship last Friday, and have been completely throwing myself into getting the house together. The yard has been entirely in my domain, since Nick hates plants and lawns. Fine. But here's how far I've come in my week off:

Before. Super intense, right? When the neighbors saw I was doing yardwork, they all started rushing out offering to loan me their lawnmowers. It was actually kinda sweet, even though they've clearly been judging the crap out of my yard.

After. Glorious, glorious after. And the vines on the railing belong there: that's spaghetti squash.

And here's a close-up of my mulched out garden bed and new tree, before the lawn was mowed.

Not bad, is it? And I did it all by myself with just hand tools. Well, except for the guys who mowed the lawn.*

Nick and I did rip out the basement carpe together; he pulled it up and cut it into pieces, and I rolled it up and toted it up the stairs and outside. I didn't write about it here, but soon after we moved in, Beans got a bladder infection and started peeing ALL OVER the basement (poor sweet thing hadn't gone outside the litter box before and hasn't since). We steam cleaned down there and briefly had a tenant; it was OK during her tenure. But then, right during the June heatwave, we had unexplained flooding down there (thanks broken AC and washing machine!), so our carpet had become a travesty.

But then, there's what we found underneath:

That's right. It's effing asbestos tile. Because apparently this IS your grandma's house.

But are you sure it's really asbest- Oh. Yeah, that's asbestos.

So our next unexpected project is to seal off the vinyl asbestos tile (wasn't the previous owner supposed to disclose this? raggedy heifer), put down quarter-inch Hardiebacker and then slap down some smooth-ass wood look ceramic tile. Seriously, have you seen this stuff? It's dope. 

And that's a week in the life of the Jolly-Paleos house. I'm giving myself a two-week vacation before I jump back into research on September 2nd, so expect more house photos.


*Chris Morrison of Out of Control Lawns (rude!) is seriously one of the nicest guys ever. He did our front and back yard, plus detailing some of our edges, and only charged us $35. You should call him and get your lawn did - (301) 908-3569.

What'd the five fingers say to the face?

SLAP. 

I love her and all, but if I have to listen to her sing "Where Do Broken Hearts Go" into this lighter-microphone and call back, "Whitney, somebody lied to you!" 

ONE. 

MORE. 

TIME. 

I'm gonna go slap him myself.